On Fri, 20 Mar 2009 20:08:43 +0100 Julien Cristau <jcristau@debian.org> wrote: > On Fri, 2009-03-20 at 19:03 +0000, Neil Williams wrote: > > On Fri, 20 Mar 2009 14:45:09 +0100 (CET) > > Andreas Tille <tillea@rki.de> wrote: > > > > > I tried to find a clear advise how to reasonable format lists inside long > > > descriptions of packages. The only thing I know is that lines with two > > > leading spaces is considered verbose. > > > > Packages.gz is already 26Mb - I'd like to find ways to shorten the > > package descriptions, not lengthen it. :-( > > Yeah, I'm sure being consistent about whether we use 2 or 3 spaces for > indented lists in descriptions is going to make that file a lot harder > to compress. I'd like to get the longest descriptions out of Packages.gz completely, so encouraging their retention it not ideal. It's not about whether 2 or 3 spaces should be used, it's about whether such detailed content deserves to be in Packages.gz in the first place. If there is going to be discussion on standardising on some form of indentation, it's worth considering whether there isn't a better way of providing the data itself to achieve other benefits. Indents would need changes in all affected packages - it might be easier to provide a different means that also reduces the size of the Packages.gz file at the same time so that packages only need to be changed once. My comment for this RFC is, therefore, that better formatting for long descriptions should include a review of whether the long description deserves to be that long in the first place, whether the long description merely duplicates data already available via debtags and whether the long description should be trimmed for the package in question *as well as* standardising the formatting of what remains. Better can be construed to mean more - I merely want maintainers to consider whether better actually means less. -- Neil Williams ============= http://www.data-freedom.org/ http://www.nosoftwarepatents.com/ http://www.linux.codehelp.co.uk/
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